Call parking and retrieval are an integral part of conventional communication technologies such as in PBXs. A parked call is typically a time-extended call transfer. Call parking is restricted to just audio calls and a single modality in the phone communication systems.
Modern communication systems have a large number of capabilities including integration of various communication modalities with different services. For example, instant messaging, voice/video communications, data/application sharing, white-boarding, and other forms of communication may be combined with presence and availability information of subscribers. Such systems may provide subscribers with the enhanced capabilities such as providing instructions to callers for various status categories, alternate contacts, calendar information, and comparable features.
With the advent of modern communication systems such as unified communications and the prevalent use of desktop and soft-phone based telephony, the above mentioned modalities and others are commonly utilized in two-party or multi-party communications. While these modalities provide an enriched experience to the users, they also provide different challenges and opportunities for handling communications at the system level.